Chopped and screwed
Chopped and screwed (also called screwed and chopped or slowed and throwed) is a music genre and technique of remixing music that involves slowing down the tempo and DJing. It was developed in the Houston hip hop scene in the early 1990s by DJ Screw. The screwed technique involves slowing the tempo of a song down to 60 and 70 quarter-note beats per minute and applying techniques such as skipping beats, record scratching, stop-time and affecting portions of the original composition to create a "chopped-up" version of the song.[2]
This article is about the technique. For the album by MC Breed, see Chopped and Screwed (album). For the song by T-Pain, see Chopped 'n' Skrewed.Chopped and screwed
History[edit]
1990: Creation[edit]
Preceding the late 1990s, most Southern hip hop was upbeat and fast, like Miami bass and Memphis, which was inspired by Afrika Bambaataa & the Soulsonic Force with their groundbreaking track "Planet Rock". Unlike its southern musical counterparts Houston's rap style has consistently remained slower, even in the beginning of Houston hip hop, as can be heard on the earliest Houston based group Geto Boys records from the mid to late 80's. It is unknown when DJ Screw definitively created "screwed and chopped" music. Screw's former manager Charles Washington stated, "Screw mistakenly created the sound while hanging out with friends at an apartment in the late 80s."[3] Screw discovered that dramatically reducing the pitch of a record gave a mellow, heavy sound that emphasized lyrics to the point of storytelling. Initially, the slow-paced hip hop genre was referred to as laid-back driving music and was limited to South Houston until it was popularized by DJs such as DJ T-Rent Dinero and DJ Z-Rusty.[4]
Stylistic developments[edit]
Future screw and lean house[edit]
In the mid-2010s, producers on SoundCloud began experimenting with fusing chopped and screwed music and EDM. It has since developed into subgenres such as "future screw and lean house".[11]